


It's You

by Daisey_May



Category: American Gods (TV), American Gods - Neil Gaiman
Genre: Belief, F/M, Falling In Love, Fluff and Angst, Kissing, Love, True Love, madwife
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-18 07:41:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21990637
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daisey_May/pseuds/Daisey_May
Summary: Laura has moved to Lakeside to be closer to Shadow and to develop her plan against Wednesday.  Walking home one night in the snow she finds someone she had thought was lost forever, and her newfound belief may have had something to do with it.
Relationships: Laura Moon & Mad Sweeney, Laura Moon/Mad Sweeney, madwife - Relationship
Comments: 2
Kudos: 41





	It's You

**Author's Note:**

> Just a short story that popped into my mind. There will be a couple more chapters added eventually. Enjoy! <3

# It’s You

It was snowing.

Again.

It had snowed nearly every day since she had arrived in Lakeside. She was used to snow, though, and granted they had never gotten this much in Eagle Point, she hadn’t been in Lakeside long enough to learn to dislike it, or see it as a nuisance. She was still able to see the beauty in it.

When she wasn’t working, or developing her plan to take down Wednesday, she spent most of her time just sitting in her apartment, a fire burning in the fireplace, drifting off and daydreaming about _him_ , and watching the snow change the landscape over and over again. It was a kind of peace that helped her remember, and forget, and held her thoughts at bay, especially when they turned dark.

The walk back to her apartment from Shadow’s was short, but she took her time. It was late, and the stretch of road in between each dim street light was shadowy and dark, just how she liked it.

She had been there later than she had intended to stay, but they had had a couple of drinks, and she had gotten him to talk about things that she needed to hear.

Their relationship had shifted dramatically over the past few months, and while the had come to the agreement that they were much happier apart, the mutual understanding and acceptance helped them to find their way back to a genuine friendship, and with that friendship, vital information she needed about Wednesday and his plans.

So when she got him talking, she stayed.

The night was still, and nearly soundless, and light snow fell magically around her, as if in slow motion. Each time she stepped under the street light, the snow took on a goldish hue that reminded her of him and the spinning, glinting horde. It had taken her a while to get there, but now she was able to smile to herself at the memory, feeling something close to happy for the first time in a long time.

She had just stepped out of the light and into the stretch of dark when a tremor shimmied up her spine, and the hair on the back of her neck prickled and stood. The smile slipped instantly from her face and butterflies burst in her stomach, propelling her heart into a gallop. She spun around, eyes wide and searching. She could feel him in the air, feel his vibrations like an electric current piercing her skin.

This wasn’t the first time, but she had yet to become used to the false sensations and mistaken identities that set off alarms in her brain. Once hope and belief had settled in her heart, it was nearly impossible to break, even though each time it nearly killed her and set back the delicate progress she had made.

She was about to turn and continue walking when she heard a shuffling and her eyes darted to the shadows of the woods.

“Come out, whoever the fuck you are!” She yelled into the quiet air, her breath forming into puffs of white in front of her.

There was a shuffling again, and then he appeared.

He stepped out from behind a tree, from the shadows and into the low light cast by the street lamp. She stared, unmoving and disbelieving.

It took her a minute, but when she realized it was him, her heart surged painfully in her chest, and she dropped into a low crouch as if she had been pressed down by some unseen force. She spread her hands over her eyes in an attempt to catch her breath and her sanity.

“Laura.”

_No._

She stilled. No breath, no heartbeat, her body utterly silent.

_Not him. Not him._ She repeated to herself.

“Laura,” he repeated, louder this time, and she jumped. The tone of what was undeniably his voice saying each part of her name calmly and carefully sent a wave of repressed pain through her.

She whimpered, despair creasing her brow. She felt betrayed by her own mind, remembering the dreams and hallucinations she had worked so hard to control.

“Will you look at me, please?”

_Ok. Ok._

She nodded, took several deep breaths, pulled her hands from her eyes, and looked up.

He had stepped further into the light and she could see his face fully now.

He was distressed, concern for her pouring out from every part, his fists clenched at his side as if he were holding himself back from running to her and sweeping her into his arms.

It was him. It had to be him. But… different, somehow.

There were no scars or cuts or bruises. His skin was smooth and glowing in a way she had never seen before. His clothes were the same, but he carried himself differently, his shoulders pushed back, exuding confidence, and bravery, and fearlessness and a faint golden aura that had to have been a trick of the light…

_No, not him,_ she thought.

She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to shake the image in front of her from her mind.

She shakily stood, wiping away the tears that slipped from her eyes with the heel of her hand.

“It can’t be.”

“It’s me.”

“It’s not. Get out of my mind.”

“What? Laura. It’s me.”

Tears welled. She held them back.

“How then?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know for sure…”

“No. If it were you, you would know how you came back,” she said, shaking her head and taking a step away from him.

He took a few steps towards her. She noticed his gait, his heavy, slightly awkward stride that was unmistakably his, and she swallowed because he felt so real.

“That’s not always how it works, love.”

He took another tentative step towards her. She took a step away.

“You… you disappeared.”

“Did I?”

“Where did you disappear to?”

He shrugged again. “I don’t really remember. One minute I was laying on the floor in Cairo with a hole in my chest, and the next I’m sitting under a bridge next to a frozen river.”

“Why here?”

“You’re here. And there’s belief here. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?”

She was silent, her outward appearance doing what it did best, hiding the turmoil of her mind and her soul.

She thought of the small gifts that her and Salim and even Shadow on occasion, had been leaving out at night, the looks they would share when they would wake the next day to find them gone, not knowing if it were the intended god that was feeding off of their newfound faith.

Maybe they had finally hit their target.

“You don’t look like yourself,” he said, slightly perplexed.

“Well, neither do you.”

“Are you alive?” He asked, tilting his head and narrowing his eyes. A faint smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. She blushed.

“Are you?” She countered.

“It would appear so.”

“Then there’s you answer. Tell me something,” she said, not giving him a chance to ask questions, nor paying mind to the wave of shock that passed passed over his face.

“What?” He asked softly, looking at her through the snow as if it were for the first time.

“If you’re him then tell me something about me that only you would know.”

“Oh, for fuck sakes, Laura. It’s me.”

“See, you keep saying my name, and you’ve never said my name before. It’s always _dead wife, asshole_ or… the c word…” she said with a grimace, doing her best at imitating his Irish accent.

He cringed. “Christ. Is that supposed to be my voice you’re supposed to be mocking?”

She shrugged and looked down at her feet to hide her smile.

“So what, I can’t say your name, then?”

“Well, it just doesn’t sound like you, which leads me to believe you are _not_ you. So, prove it. What’s something about me, something only he… or you, would know?”

He sighed, rubbing the back of his head roughly with hand. Her heart fluttered. She ignored it.

“I don’t know…” he mumbled.

She crossed her arms over her chest and rolled her eyes as she looked away.

“See? That...” he started, pointing at her accusingly.

Her eyes flashed to his.

“What?”

“That, exactly what you’re doing. The crossed arms, the rolling eyes, the denial. This whole fucking show. This is what you do.”

“What do I do?” She shouted.

“You still can’t believe anything, can you, dead wife? You can’t, even for just one fucking moment, believe that there’s something bigger than you at play. I’m _here,_ it’s _me,_ ” he said adamantly, his voice rising.

She considered arguing, or telling him about how she would see “him” everywhere, and how upsetting and confusing that would be, and how this might be just like one of those times. How she had trained herself to be careful so she could stop feeling the hurt. But she didn’t, and her stubbornness kept her mouth shut.

“Don’t do this. I’m standing right fucking here, alive and really fucking confused and the first thing I want to, _need to do,_ is see you and…”

“And what?” She asked hesitantly.

“Forget it,” he snapped, and she felt a twinge in her stomach at his frustration.

He sighed. “You want to know something, eh? If I play this little game, are you gonna believe me then?”

She nodded numbly.

“Great, then here’s something.”

He stepped closer to her, so close she could feel the angry heat radiating from his body. All at once, his scent invaded her senses and she faltered, just slightly.

“You have a scar,” he started.

“Ya, no shit,” she scoffed.

“No. Another one.”

She tensed when the tip of his finger reached out to delicately trace the line of her hip bone through her light sweater.

“It runs from here,” he continued, lazily sliding his finger down and across the space where her appendix used to occupy. “To here.”

“Anyone could see that,” she whispered, her breath picking up, her voice betraying her emotions.

“And it’s sensitive to touch, if I remember correctly. Makes you shiver,” he continued, ignoring her, taking a further step into her space, and she had to crane her neck to look at him.

He slid one finger back over her scar to her hip bone before abandoning it to run them up her arm and the side of her neck.

“But not as much as here,” he murmured, his voice suddenly very low and thick. He curled his fingers around the back of her ear, resting at the soft just behind her ear lobe.

“This spot, well… why don’t I just show you.”

Her eyes drifted shut and she shivered at the touch, feeling lightheaded as his thumb pressed featherlight circles into the tender dip behind her ear. His fingers threaded into her hair to hold the back of her neck, cradling her head as it slowly, dreamily rolled back, as if he knew she would do that.

Somewhere through the fog of her mind she thought about how much she hated how right he was, and how weak and vulnerable this made her feel. But she didn’t hate it enough to pull away, and locking herself away had never done her, or him, any favors.

The loneliness she had felt in the time of his absence had been far too raw and painful, and had borne some of the worst nights spent alone in her life. Like a beast awakened, it had pulled her back to the habits of her old life that she never wanted to revisit, the habits that, around him, had never dared to show their face.

She knew in the deepest parts of her soul that this was him, and that maybe it was her belief that had brought him back. Something inside her that had been hidden away for a long time started to emerge.

His caresses slowed and she awakened from her reverie like she was pulled from a dream. Her eyes drifted open, and she met his. He had been watching her, she knew, the whole time, reveling in the feeling of being right, of course, but at the same time losing himself in her again, and whatever self control he had tried to maintain. She didn’t look away, she’d made that mistake before. She stared straight into his dark eyes full of longing and desire, knew that they mirrored her own, her chest rising and falling quickly, matching his heavy breath.

He leaned down to her, and her body floated up and into him, her eyes drifted closed again.

He brushed his warm lips across her cheek, and over her ear, lowering to that same spot just behind her earlobe. His smell surrounded her, and her mind swirled in the sweetness and the feelings it stirred. He hovered there for a moment, his breath hot against her skin, and she swallowed down a moan, her coat slipping from her hands as she lifted them to hold the top of his belt in anticipation and to help keep her steady.

With deliberate slowness, he pressed a line of soft kisses from her ear, down and along the curve of her neck, dipping his tongue out to taste her, baring his teeth to nip gently, then with a little more pressure, just enough to push her to the brink of pain, just how she liked it.

_He knew how she liked it. He remembered._

With a sharp intake of breath she grasped the bottom of his shirt, knotting it in her fist.

“Ok. It’s you,” she relented weakly.

“It’s me,” he said, nuzzling her neck.

“How long?” She asked, still breathless and holding his shirt in her hand.

“I came straight to you,” he whispered into her hair and she shuddered and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him into a tight hug that he eagerly returned with a sigh that sounded something like relief. He lifted her and she wrapped her legs around him and pressed her face into his neck and breathed him in deeply, letting herself feel it. The pain, the heartache, the immense loneliness. The release, the relief, the belief. The love.

They stood like that for a few minutes, under the light and the swirling golden snow, the tightness of their embrace taking the place of words that were difficult to say. She pulled back to look into his eyes, and she thought about kissing him, and knew he was thinking the same thing, but they didn’t, and that felt ok. There would be other opportunities for that.

He set her on the ground and took a step back, never taking his eyes off of her. Under his intense gaze she suddenly felt nervous, exposed and a little embarrassed, and a burning flush rose in her cheeks because she was still new at this, this vulnerability.

The snow was falling heavier now, and suddenly it felt colder. She pulled her jacket on and wrapped it tightly around herself, noticing that he was shivering slightly and that he was only wearing his old jean jacket.

“You’re not prepared for this.”

“No I am not,” he said, looking up at the sky with a frown, a hard shiver running through him.

“Come on,” she said, turning. “I have somewhere we can go.”

He nodded, and taking a deep sigh, he followed her.


End file.
